


The Christmas Party

by Chlobliviate



Series: A Very Potter Christmas [6]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Modern with Magic, Always, Bisexual Remus Lupin, Bisexual Sirius Black, M/M, Oblivious James Potter, Remus Lupin & Lily Evans Potter Friendship, Remus Lupin Needs a Hug, Sirius Black & Lily Evans Potter Friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-12
Updated: 2018-12-12
Packaged: 2019-09-16 22:44:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,596
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16962879
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chlobliviate/pseuds/Chlobliviate
Summary: After Euphemia and Fleamont ask Sirius to bring his boyfriend to their Christmas party, Sirius panics. He doesn't actually have a boyfriend. So, naturally, he asks Remus, who he has feelings for. Lily and James are pretty much just amused the whole time.Modern day with magic.





	The Christmas Party

**Author's Note:**

> I will get round to updating my longer fics at some point I swear, I just really wanted to write some Christmassy things. I have a couple more short festive fics to upload in the next couple of weeks.
> 
> Hope you enjoy :)

Remus’ first clue that something was amiss was the unopened advent calendar on the coffee table. While he loved opening the calendar each morning and savouring the small chocolate with his tea, Sirius was known to go through several calendars each year because he couldn’t control himself around them. Remus knew this was probably a great deal to do with his childhood and never brought it up, buying five or six most years and replacing the calendars as he found them empty. The first of December had been a big deal at Hogwarts, and for the three years, they’d shared a flat since graduating. Sirius always said that this would be the year that he only needed one calendar, and it never was. This year, though, Sirius seemed to have neglected his calendar for the entire day. 

“Pads?” He called out. There was no reply. Maybe he’d decided to take Pete up on that ‘bachelor’s drink’ after all. Though it had been a while since Sirius had brought anyone back to the flat. (Nine months, not that Remus was counting.) Remus knew that it would start up again at some point. It wasn’t that he didn’t want his friend to have fun, but he could really do without hearing the intimate details. 

He made a cup of tea before retreating to his room. He knew that after taking most of the weekend before Christmas off for the moon, it was likely that the muggle bookshop he was working in would fire him in the new year once the holiday season was over, so he’d been picking up any extra hours he could to hopefully tide him over until he could find a new job. He settled himself, propped against a mountain of pillows with the latest MJ Arlidge book in hand. He’d developed a real taste for muggle crime fiction of late, something James and Sirius, as Aurors, had found hilarious and, upon trying to read said books, baffling. 

He was only three chapters in when he heard the crack of someone apparating. He listened for any additional voices but only heard Sirius swear as he walked into the coffee table. The coffee table had been a fixture for two of the three years that they’d lived there, but post-apparition, Sirius never seemed to remember it was there, and Remus was too amused by it at this point to move the table. 

“You home, Moony?” Sirius was outside his door. Remus flicked his wand and the door opened. “How was work?” Sirius looked miserable.

“Busy. Everything ok?” He set his book down, shooting his friend a concerned look.

“Yeah, I just— I had dinner with Mum and Dad last night.” He smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes. By Mum and Dad, Remus knew that he meant Euphemia and Fleamont Potter, not ‘The Blacks’ as they were referred to now. The day that Sirius had accidentally called Monty ‘Dad’ was one of the memories that Sirius used when casting a patronus. He crossed the room and sprawled at the bottom of Remus’ bed. “They send their love, obviously.”

“Are you ok? Have you forgotten what day it is? Are you sick?”

“It’s the first of December,” Sirius said, flatly. “I appear to be in perfect health. The prime of life, one might say."

“You haven’t opened your advent calendar, and now you’ve gone all posh.” Remus was genuinely worried now. “What’s going on?”

“Mum’s been trying to set me up with this bloke. Some son of one of her friends, I don’t know. She’s been on about it for months since Jamie and Lils got engaged and I tried to discourage her by lying and saying I was seeing someone, but that he wasn’t ready to meet them because we didn’t think it was all that serious.”

“I thought dating for you was always Sirius.” When Sirius didn’t laugh or even smile, Remus crawled to the foot of the bed and stared at his friend. “What happened?”

“She told me that I have to bring him to the Christmas party,” Sirius said quietly. “Every excuse I tried to make, she had an answer for. She seemed so upset that I might be ashamed of them or something. So eventually I agreed.”

“When’s the party?” 

“Tomorrow.” Sirius groaned. “I’m fucked.”

“I can see why that might be a problem.” 

“What am I going to do, Moons?” Sirius looked devastated, “She can’t find out I lied to her, it would hurt her so much. But how am I supposed to find a boyfriend in one day, let alone someone who can convince her that we’ve been together for months?”

“I suppose asking Benjy is off the table?” Sirius had dated Benjy for almost a year until their cataclysmic breakup on Boxing Day the previous year. The details of the break up had never come out and eventually, James stopped pestering Sirius and they accepted they’d never know what happened. 

“Very, very off the table. Not even in the room where the table is.” 

“Is there no-one we know who could pretend, just for tomorrow? Gideon Prewett?” Remus knew Gideon had always had a soft spot for Sirius. When he and Remus had dated briefly in their seventh year at Hogwarts, he’d been sweet, but always a little too interested in whatever Sirius happened to be doing. It took Remus longer than it should have to notice, as it turned out that he was also a little too interested in whatever Sirius happened to be doing.

“What about—“ Sirius’ eyes lit up before he quickly shook his head. “No, never mind.”

“Who were you thinking?” 

“Well… If there’s anyone who knows enough about my life to pretend to have dated me for nine months, it’s you. But also that would… be really weird so… yeah, forget I said anything.”

Remus blanched, “Me?”

“It was stupid. Fuck. Sorry, I shouldn’t have—“

Remus knew it was a bad idea. He’d acknowledged his feelings for Sirius in their sixth year, after the incident with Snape, but knew better than to think he could ever act on them. He considered that getting to pretend to date Sirius for one night might get any residual feelings out of his system. Before he could really think it through, he said, “If it will stop you feeling like this, I’ll do it.”

Sirius sat up, eyes wide. “You’ll d… You will?”

“I’m going to the party anyway, it can’t hurt to tell a few white lies while we’re there. Besides, the only real difference between best friends and dating is sex, and nobody’s exactly going to quiz us on our fictional sex life at your parents’ Christmas party. Shouldn’t be too hard.” He forced a smile, but he was already panicking.

“James might.” Sirius frowned. 

“Did it occur to you that we might clue James and Lily in on this plan?” Remus was already planning to text Lily as soon as Sirius left the room. She’d been the only one to figure out why Remus hadn’t noticed that Gideon was into Sirius, James had just laughed because he’d always been called the oblivious one and Pete— well, Pete was probably there too.

“It did not.” 

“So, we’ll be ok?”

“Yeah, I’m sure we will.” Sirius stood up, stretching his arms above his head. Remus was grateful that Sirius had opted to wear a longline t-shirt today, otherwise that distracting slither of skin would have— “Are you sure you’re alright with this? You look a bit traumatised.”

“Just tired.” Remus smiled at his friend. 

“I feel that. Moody’s had us on call all night every night this week, on top of our normal hours. I can’t remember the last time I got a good night’s sleep.”

“I might have a sleeping-draught in my post-moon stash.” Remus ignored Sirius’ feeble protests. “Would your pretend boyfriend let you go without sleep?”

Sirius laughed, “I suppose he wouldn’t if he were a good sort.” Remus handed him the small vial, rolling his eyes for good measure. Sirius uncorked it, pinched his nose and downed the potion in one gulp. Wincing at the taste, he gestured towards Remus’ lukewarm tea. When Remus looked aghast, he wheezed, “Would you deny your pretend boyfriend the—”

“Fine.” Remus handed him the cup, regretting ever having brought up ‘pretend boyfriend’ as leverage. He’d known Sirius for over ten years now, he knew that Sirius would rinse this for all that it was worth. 

“Could use a warming charm,” Sirius muttered, yelping as the tea became very hot suddenly. “I wish you’d teach me how to do wandless-wordless.”  
“I don’t even know how _I_ do it. It’s only very certain things that it works on.”

“Still. They should pay you to study it and then you can know and teach everyone.” Sirius frowned as Remus laughed, “I’m seri— I mean it. Hit up Dumbles, I’m sure he’d be game. He’s good mates with Flamel, you know.”

“I hardly have anything so sophisticated as the elixir of life inside my brain, Pads.” Remus sighed, “I appreciate your faith in me, though.” He smiled fondly. “Now bugger off to bed, you have a hot date tomorrow.”

Sirius flushed and stammered as he retreated towards the door, “A hot— yeah, yep, uh-huh. G’night Moons."

As Sirius pulled the door closed, he started to panic. Not a standard panic, no, this was a big, gay panic. He closed his own door behind him before casting a silencing charm and apparating away.

He arrived in James and Lily’s living room, finding his friends kissing on the sofa like horny teenagers. 

“Sirius!” Lily yelped. “We talked about this.”

“I know, and I’m sorry, if I had any other options I wouldn’t have come here, I swear.” James frowned as he saw how anxious Sirius was. 

“I’ll put the kettle on, so tell Lily whatever it is that you can’t talk to Moony about and then you can both catch me up.” He stood up, tried to flatten down his hair slightly, but it wasn’t happening. He left the living room and Lily shot Sirius a worried look.

“Nobody’s dead or dying.” He reassured her, “I was grumpy all day, after what Mum said at dinner last night.”

“About bringing your imaginary boyfriend to the party?” Sirius nodded.

“So I went out with Pete after work, had a few drinks. I wasn’t wankered but my spirits were definitely lifted a bit. I came home and talked to Moony about it, and then I just… asked him if he’d pretend to be my fake boyfriend tomorrow.”

“I don’t know if I’d rather him agree or tell you to fuck off.” 

“Well, he agreed. Then he referred to himself as my pretend boyfriend and a hot date and I know you’re his friend more than you are mine, and that’s fine, Remus is much nicer than I am and I know you’ll probably have opinions about this but I have low key been into Remus for a while and now I’m feeling like I can’t breathe and ten minutes ago we were talking about—”

“Is this another big, gay panic?” James appeared in the doorway with a tea tray. Sometimes he was more motherly than his mother. 

“In my defence, it’s been a while since I’ve had one.” Sirius pouted. 

“He was in a mood because your mum doesn’t want him to die alone, then he got a bit pissed and asked Re to pretend to be his boyfriend at the party.”

James’ eyebrows shot up. “Moony? Still?”

Lily’s phone vibrated in her pocket. She checked it inconspicuously, knowing it would probably be Remus. Only her and Remus had phones. James had tried having one, but preferred owls, and Sirius for some reason just couldn’t deal with having one.

_**Re** _  
_Prepare yourself for a wall of text._  
_So, you know how sometimes I just make really questionable decisions? Well, today, despite being in love with him for years, I agreed to pretend to be Sirius’ boyfriend at the party tomorrow. Why would I do this? Why tf would I say yes? Am I really this masochistic? I don’t even know what was going through my mind. Whenever I look at him it’s like my mind switches off. Fuck. He was so mopey, and I couldn’t stand watching him look like a kicked puppy, so I just agreed. It might also get Sirius out of my system in a good way, right? I also referred to myself as his ‘hot date’, at which point he couldn’t even speak and had to leave my room. Is that a good thing or a bad thing? Have I messed it up already? Is this what the whole of tomorrow is going to be like? Lils I need help. What the fuck have I done? Oh fuck, is he going to want to kiss me? Do I want him to kiss me? I might be panicking._  
_Can we get brunch tomorrow? Could do with a pep talk and you’re the peppiest talker I know._

While James and Sirius were speaking in hushed tones about ‘what happened with Benjy’ and ‘marauderly conduct’, Lily replied.

_**Lily** _  
_He’s probably freaking out as much as you are. Stop asking yourself questions that you don’t have answers to. Put Mamma Mia on, make yourself some tea and finish your chapter. Then try and get some sleep and I’ll come and pick you up at 11 tomorrow._

_**Re** _  
_This book has weirdly short chapters, I’ll finish three. See you at 11._

Lily smiled fondly, unaware she was being watched. 

“What did he say?” Sirius asked quietly.

“Don’t put me in the middle.” Lily shrugged, “Maybe he is also having a big, gay panic.”

Sirius snorted. “I’d honestly pay to see Moons have a big, gay panic. Can you imagine Prongs?” But James was staring at his fiancée intently. 

“James Potter, you can stop looking at me like that, I’m not telling you either.”

“I’m going to be your husband!” He cried indignantly. 

“Yes, and I know that whatever I tell you in confidence will end up being told to Sirius even then.” She smiled warmly at them both and Sirius had a new appreciation for her. Even though James was horrendous at keeping secrets, had outrageously appalling hair and was a general prat, she still loved him and wanted to marry him. He thought back on his past serious relationships, Benjy Fenwick, Marlene McKinnon and Emmeline Vance. Then he thought back to the not so serious relationships. Not one of those people had he ever loved or even liked unconditionally. Remus on the other hand…

“You alright?” James flicked the side of his head. “You look all manic.”

“Is it possible to love someone and not know it?” Lily’s eyes grew wide. “Just… wondering.”

James was also staring at him now. “Love?”

“Maybe. I don’t know.” Sirius knew, but he also knew that he definitely shouldn’t tell James. “I should go. I took a sleeping draught and I don’t want to pass out on your floor. Sorry I barged in.” 

Before either of them could argue, he apparated away. They both stared at the spot where he’d been sitting previously. 

“He loves Remus,” James said eventually. 

Lily nodded, “I think he does.”

***

“Morning.” Remus jumped as Sirius appeared in the doorway. 

“Morning.” He smiled, “What time did you get back last night?”

“What— I— What?”

Remus looked at him like he was an idiot. “You know I have ridiculous hearing.” Sirius suddenly remembered the layers upon layers of silencing charms that needed to be cast when they’d been at school before Remus was comfortable with any of them wanking in the dorm. Sirius had assumed that it was just Remus being a bit neurotic but this made a lot more sense. “Why do you look like you’ve just pissed yourself?”

“I just forgot.”

“Sneaking around?” Remus raised an eyebrow.

“Just went to see James to tell him the change in arrangements for tomorrow.” He knew that it sounded like a stupid lie. “Wanted to give him a heads up. Didn’t want to wake you up if I apparated back late.”

“How considerate.” Remus chuckled. “Well, Lily’s picking me up in a minute so I’d better…” He gestured towards the door and stood up. “What’s the plan for later?”

“Floo in just before seven, so don’t be galavanting about all day.” Sirius grinned at him. “Have fun.”

“Thanks.” Remus knew that Sirius had something else going on in his mind. Maybe he regretted asking him and was looking for a way to break it to him gently. He tried to remove that thought but it kept coming back even when he was with Lily. When he voiced it to her, she laughed so hard that she almost thought her hot chocolate would come out of her nose. 

“You really think that the man that you’ve lived with for three years, who hasn’t brought anyone back to the flat for over six months, regrets asking to you pretend to date him? You’re supposed to be the smart one.” He looked even more puzzled now. “Just, trust me.”

“You agreed to marry James, I don’t think your judgement is something to be trusted.” Remus flinched as she smacked his arm. “Ow!”

“What are you planning on wearing?” Her eyes glinted mischievously.

“This is not turning into a shopping trip.” He shook his head, “Even if I could afford a new outfit, the shops will be heaving.”

She considered this, “Fine, no shopping trip. But what _are_ you planning to wear?”

“My nice jeans and my burgundy jumper?” He was already questioning it. 

“Throw on the cute Gryffindor scarf Sirius got you last year and your black grown-up coat.”  
“Can we not call it a grown-up coat?” Remus was laughing. “That sounds like everything else I own is for kids.”

“Red converse?” He nodded, “There’s your outfit.”

“Two, if not three of those three things are going to be removed as soon as I get in the house.”

“And the rest will likely get removed later, what’s your point?” She sipped her hot chocolate in victorious silence as Remus spluttered. 

***

“You look rather dashing,” Remus said, once they’d both gotten ready. Sirius was wearing a tight black t-shirt under a loose red shirt, his tightest jeans and red converse. Remus knew it was probably just a coincidence. 

“As do you. Mum and Dad are going to fawn over you more than usual.” Remus rolled his eyes. James had clued his parents into why Remus was sick so often as soon as they’d graduated Hogwarts and they’d thoroughly spoiled him every time they’d seen him ever since.

“However shall I cope?” He said dryly. “Ready?” 

Sirius nodded and they both reached for the floo powder at the time, jumping back like they’d been electrocuted when their hands met. Remus stepped back and followed Sirius once he’d gone through the fire. When he landed at The Potters’ house he smiled as he saw Sirius had waited for him. 

“Thought I’d be a pretty poor boyfriend if I didn’t.” He shrugged. “May I help you with your coat?”

“Thanks.” Remus allowed Sirius to take his coat and scarf and hang them up before they turned to the door. Sirius held out his hand, which, after a second, Remus took in his. The butterflies that had been fluttering in his stomach since Sirius had asked him decided that now was the time to swarm. 

They left the cloakroom and ventured into the main house. Fleamont and Euphemia had asked Sirius to arrive slightly so they could meet his boyfriend before the festivities began. They found both of them in the kitchen dancing to the radio. 

“Sirius!” Euphemia gasped. “Is he here?”

“Anyone would think you’re not happy to see your favourite son.” Sirius pouted. 

“Nonsense. Oh, hello Remus, dear. You’re looking a little peaky, come in, have a cup of tea.” Remus shrugged before dropping Sirius’ hand and crossing the kitchen to where she was now pouring him a cup of the tastiest tea he’d ever had. “So when is your boyfriend getting here, Sirius? Or do you have another excuse for us?”

“You’re serving him tea, Mum.” Sirius grinned as she spun around, looking between him and Remus. 

She stopped suddenly, raising an eyebrow. “Wait a second, this is all very convenient.” She narrowed her eyes, looking at Remus. “Did he put you up to this?”

“At first, certainly.” He said and Sirius’ heart dropped. “But then I realised that he was…” Remus suppressed a smirk, “He was serious. We didn’t tell James and Lily until recently. You think _you_ were surprised.” 

Sirius let out an inaudible sigh of relief. “Do you really have so little faith in me that I’d need to coerce Moony into pretending to date me?”

“Must you call him Moony, Sirius? It seems rather insensitive.” Remus was enjoying this far too much already. “Sorry, I should have believed you.”

“Are you not thrilled?” Remus asked, innocently.

“Oh Remus, of course we are.” She fussed around with the tea set on the counter. “You’re finally family.”

Remus and Sirius exchanged a look behind her back. Fleamont caught this. “Not that you weren’t family anyway.”

“Oh, I just keep saying the wrong thing.” She sat down. “I’m just surprised.”

“I always thought I had more sense than to date Sirius too.” Remus said, “It was as much as a shock for me.”

“So how did this happen?”

Remus suddenly realised that he and Sirius hadn’t actually discussed this, and that was a pretty major mistake to have made so early on. “Well,” Remus began. “Sirius bought me a particularly lovely copy of my favourite book for my birthday. I didn’t have any real hope that he returned my feelings before then.” They were hanging on his every word. “Somewhere between that and getting drunk for James’ birthday a few weeks later, we managed to have some semblance of an adult conversation.”

Fleamont turned to Sirius who had been leaning on the doorframe staring at Remus, “ _You_ had an adult conversation?”

Sirius jumped slightly. “You give me absolutely no credit. I bought Moons a thoughtful gift _and_ had an adult conversation, thanks.”

Internally, Sirius was panicking. Had Remus actually clocked on to his feelings? The book was definitely a little much, even for him. He knew that he wasn’t exactly a subtle person, but then, James had seemed surprised to learn that he still had feelings for Remus.

“It’s true.” Remus said wearily. “He did.”

“Well, I didn’t see this coming.” She looked over at Sirius, then back to Remus. “But I couldn’t ask for a better son-in-law.”

“Mum, did you just propose to Remus for me?” Remus was shaking with laughter now.

“She did the same thing to Lily too, I wouldn’t worry.” James appeared behind Sirius. “Well isn’t this cosy.” 

“Piss off.” Sirius elbowed his brother in the ribs. 

***

Sirius had dragged Remus around the party, introducing him to his parents’ friends. They were a few drinks in by this point and Sirius was starting to wax lyrical about Remus a little too realistically. By the time they reached Lily and James outside on the patio, they were definitely pushing tipsy.

“Lillian, Jimothy, you know my boyfriend, Remus.” Sirius introduced them.

“Remus? Sounds familiar.” Remus rolled his eyes as Lily held out a hand for him to shake. It meant that he had to let go of Sirius’ hand, which he really didn’t want to do. He frowned as he shook her hand, then quickly grabbed Sirius’ hand back. “Lovely to meet you, I’ve heard so much about you.” She said with a pointed look at Sirius.

“I’m just shocked you pulled it together and convinced Mum and Dad,” James said. “Not much gets past them. You must have been very convincing.”

“This might come as a surprise to you, Potter, but I’m a pretty good liar,” Remus said. “One of the best.”

“So it would seem.” James laughed. “But what is this?” He looked up, gasping dramatically, “Mistletoe?”

Remus and Sirius’ heads both snapped up. Sure enough, a glittering sprig of mistletoe hung above them. They knew it was the kind that they had helped working out the enchantments for in their fifth year at Hogwarts and that they would be unable to move further than a foot unless they kissed.

“Really, James?” Remus asked. 

“Remember the time you two dosed me with truth serum?” James grinned. Yes, they remembered. “Consider us even.”

“We should probably go somewhere else.” Lily started dragging James towards the door, “Wouldn’t want to intrude.”

“Fuck,” Sirius said under his breath. Then remembered Remus’ bat hearing. “Fuck!”

“Yeah.” Remus let go of his hand.

“No, I didn’t mean—” 

“Let’s just get it over with then.” Remus leant down slightly and pressed his lips to Sirius’ softly. It lasted less than a second, but the mistletoe exploded in a puff of red and gold smoke. “We should probably go back in. There’s probably some more people we haven’t lied to yet.”

Remus stalked inside, leaving Sirius outside alone. He swore again, loudly. He debated following Remus inside but thought the atmosphere might be somewhat ruined now. He sat on the table of the patio furniture and pulled a flask of Firewhiskey out of his back pocket. 

“I have never seen Sirius Black strike out quite so terribly.” A voice from behind him made him jump. 

“Well I might not have done so, had I not been set up by my _former_ brother.” Lily came and sat down beside him. “Did he leave?”

“No, I’m pretty sure he’s talking to Effie about her chai spices. She seems very keen on him being officially part of the family. I swear she’s happier about this than she was about James proposing.” He offered her the flask, which she accepted gratefully. “So what happened? Are you that bad at kissing?”

Sirius scoffed, “Like _Remus_ would know.”

“So…”

“I might have appeared to not want to kiss him.”

“Might have?” He reached for the flask, “No, I need this more than you do. It’s fucking cold.”

“It’s so stupid. I swore under my breath when you went inside and he heard me because he has fucking bat ears. Then he dropped my hand as if it had burned him, barely kissed me and stormed off.” Lily just stared at him. “Which I suppose he’s well in his rights to do, because I asked him to do this, and then I act like kissing him would be so bad. I didn’t even mean it like that, I just didn’t want our first kiss to be under some stupid mistletoe that James was using as revenge. I wanted it to be special.”

“You’re an idiot.”

“I’m well aware.” She handed the flask back to him. “Thanks.” He had another drink. “Did James tell you about what happened with Benjy?”

“He didn’t. He’s more loyal to you than he is to me.” She smiled. “All I know is that you broke up on Boxing Day and it was a bit of a hoo-ha.”

“Hoo-ha indeed.” Sirius laughed bitterly. “Benjy constantly thought that I was cheating on him with Re. For the whole eight months we were together, every time I brought up Remus in casual conversation or mentioned that I was spending time with him, he’d get so weird and possessive. Last Christmas I got Re that care package thing you suggested, remember? All the nice chocolate, some books, potions, that nice scarf, a bottle of Firewhiskey…” Sirius frowned, “I got Benjy a hat and some sugar quills. He was furious. He acted like he loved them on the day and then twenty-four hours later he was using them as ammunition. He told me that I was in love with Re and gave me an ultimatum. I didn’t even hesitate to choose Remus, he’s my… my best friend."

“I remember your birthday, now you mention it. You wanted to play drinking games with all of us and he wanted to do something just the two of you and was mad when you decided to do both. I thought it was weird but then I ignored it because it wasn’t really my business.” She patted his shoulder.

“He came over unannounced once and couldn’t understand why we were watching a film together like we weren’t friends for eight years before he came along. Admittedly, we were just in our pants, but the flat gets really hot in the summer. We shared a dorm for seven years, it’s not weird.” Sirius shrugged, “Well, fuck, he was probably right.”

“You cheated on him with Re?”

“Not physically, obviously. But there was a reason I wanted to spend a lot of time with him. As much time as I could, and it wasn’t just because James had finally won you over.” He said, “I really messed up. I’ve messed everything up. James always said that it would rock the boat. I told him that Peter doesn’t care about us anymore, so he should go and nag him, but he was right to nag me.”

“So… are you just going to sit here and mope?” Lily said eventually.

“Do I have any other options? Go back inside and admit to my parents that I can’t even maintain a _fake_ relationship for more than two hours? Go back inside and apologise to the person I’m in love with and then pretend that I’m not in love with him, while simultaneously pretending that I am? I _could_ just go in there and tell everyone the truth that I can’t do anything without ruining it.”

“Sirius, I— Wait, why do you think Re is mad?” She said slowly.

“I asked him a favour and then was rude to him?” Sirius frowned. He wasn’t sure what Lily’s point was. “And— and it’s just stupid because I saw that fucking mistletoe and my stomach did this thing, like the most exciting, life-changing thing was about to happen and then I fucked it up. He kissed me, and I felt like I was flying, but then he just walked off, saying something about ‘there must be people we haven’t lied to yet’. What does that even mean?”

“Stay here.” She sighed loudly, climbing to her feet and heading back towards the house.

“Again, no other options.” After a few minutes, he decided that he might as well go for a walk in the huge garden. He was kicking an old, dented quaffle around in the orchard when he heard Remus’ voice.

“Sirius?” He paused, knowing there was no way Remus could see him from the house unless he also had super sight, which Sirius was pretty sure he didn’t if the new reading glasses were anything to go by. The glasses that gave Remus the laidback-supply-teacher-who-will-teach-you-the-interesting-and-funny-parts-of-a-subject-that-the-syllabus-misses-out-and-tell-you-not-to-tell-your-regular-teacher look and secretly drove Sirius wild. The first time Remus had worn them, Sirius had to leave the room for fear of squealing like a first year Hufflepuff girl, which led Remus to believe that Sirius thought they looked funny, and he didn’t wear them much if he could help it. “For fuck's sake, are you even out here you daft prick?” His voice was nearer now. Sirius panicked and debated hiding up a tree. “I’m going to fucking kill Lily.” He muttered.

“Yeah,” Sirius said finally. “Yeah, I’m over here.” He lit his wand and walked towards the sound of Remus’ voice. “Where the fuck are _you_?”

“I can see you, hold on.” Sirius jumped as Remus’ hands landed on his shoulders. He spun around quickly. “Sorry for storming off I—”

“When I said ‘fuck’ I didn’t mean that kissing _you_ under some mistletoe would be awful, I meant that kissing you because we were _forced_ to would be—” Remus was frowning. “Moons?”

“I don’t understand.” Remus was staring at him, wide-eyed. He had hoped, of course, that Sirius asking him to do this meant that his feelings were reciprocated, but now it sounded like it was actually true. His heart was pounding in his ears as he tried to figure out what to do next. “Are you saying—”

Sirius sighed loudly before grabbing the front of Remus’ jumper and pulling him closer. Before he could overthink it anymore, he pressed his lips to Remus’. He was about to pull away when Remus slipped his hand into his hair and pulled him even closer, deepening their kiss. They separated a few minutes later, breathing heavily. 

“You understand now?” Sirius asked quietly. When Remus didn’t answer, he looked up and saw his friend smiling wonkily at him. “What?” He wasn’t expecting Remus to kiss him again. Sirius walked them back towards his dad’s shed and pushed Remus against it, opening his mouth as his tongue met Remus’. 

James and Lily poked their heads out onto the patio a while later, to see their friends walking back towards the house, hands joined together, swinging in-between them as they laughed. James swore and handed Lily a galleon. 

“Oi!” Sirius shouted as they were about to retreat back into the house. “You tossers couldn’t have given us a heads up?”

“Where’s the fun in that?” James clapped Sirius on the back as he reached them. “You finally got yourselves together?”

“You might want to rephrase that.” Remus tried to look snarky but he just couldn’t wipe the smile off his face. “But yes, we did, I think.” Sirius nodded emphatically.


End file.
